European Certificates of Origin

The sausage gets its individual character when it is supported by the name of the region it has originally come from. Throughout Europe there is a huge assortment of great foods. When a product acquires a reputation extending beyond national borders, it can face competition from other products which may pass themselves off as the genuine article and take the same name.

Our hats go off to the French who invented the idea in the 1930’s to protect their regional wines. The system used in France from the early part of the twentieth century is known as the Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée (AOC). Items that meet geographical origin and quality standards may be endorsed with a government-issued stamp which acts as an official certification of the origins and standards of the product to the consumer. In 1992, the European Union created the following systems to promote and protect food products:

PDO - Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) - covers the term used to describe foodstuffs which are produced, processed and prepared in a given geographical area using recognized know-how.

PGI - Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) - the geographical link must occur in at least one of the stages of production, processing or preparation.

Traditional Speciality Guaranteed (TSG) - does not refer to the origin but highlights traditional character, either in the composition or means of production.

This system is similar to the French Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée (AOC) system, the Denominazione di Origine Controllata (DOC) used in Italy, and the Denominación de Origen system used in Spain. The law (enforced within the EU and being gradually expanded internationally via bilateral agreements of the EU with non-EU countries) ensures that only products genuinely originating in that region are allowed in commerce as such. The purpose of the law is to protect the reputation of the regional foods and eliminate the unfair competition and misleading of consumers by non-genuine products, which may be of inferior quality or of different flavor.

These laws protect the names of wines, cheeses, hams, sausages, olives, beers, and even regional breads, fruits, and vegetables. As such, foods such as Gorgonzola, Parmigiano Reggiano, Asiago cheese, Camembert de Normandie and Champagne can only be labelled as such if they come from the designated region. To qualify as Roquefort, for example, cheese must be made from the milk of a certain breed of sheep, and matured in the natural caves near the town of Roquefort in the Aveyron region of France where it is infected with the spores of a fungus (Penicillium roqueforti) that grows in those caves. Fresh meat and meat based products (cooked, salted, smoked, etc.) are also covered by the law and many countries have already filed their products with the European Commission.

European Certificates of Origin don’t come easy and only a few countries were able to obtain them. Countries which were granted most Certificates of Origin for Meat Products and Sausages are: Portugal, Italy, Spain, France, and Germany. It shall be noted that countries that have joined the European Union at later dates still have products pending approval.

Any product that bears a certificate is certified as being unique and of the highest quality. It can be said that those certified products represent the best traditionally made products that the world has to offer. At the time of this writing (June 2010) the following countries received registrations for their meat products: